I had lunch with my son and his first grade class, yesterday. I had visited him two or three times during his kindergarten year, but this is the first time this year. It was a surprise for him, and though he normally doesn’t like to be surprised (he likes to know what’s going to happen next), he was very happy to see me standing at the cafeteria door when his class came walking down the hall in a nice, quiet line.

I held the door open for the class, and he stopped and stood with me. Twice, he announced, “This is my dad,” to his friends as they filed by us. When everyone was in the big room, he grabbed my hand and led me to their section of the tables. He had a big smile on his face, and it made me feel real good that he was so happy to have me with him.

He always brings his lunch, in his soft, red lunch case (not really a “box”), so we took a seat immediately. A couple of his friends went through the food line, but soon the whole class was seated and eating and talking and being silly 6 year olds.

They have terrible table manners. Talking with their mouth full, dropping crumbs and liquid everywhere. It was good to see that it wasn’t just my 6 year old who acted like that. Although, they seemed pretty good about taking their paper and plastic trash to the garbage cans.

One kid was obviously the class clown. He was up, down, all around the table, cracking silly “jokes,” getting everyone to laugh, and generally the being a big disruption. The noise in the whole cafeteria is as you would expect it to be: loud. The “cafeteria monitors” (teachers with lunch room duty) would come by occasionally and quiet the noisiest kids or crowds. One boy told me, “That’s Mrs. ~. She always comes by and gets us in trouble for no reason.”

The cafeteria workers were all middle-age women. About half looked like the stereotypical “lunch lady” we all picture in our minds, but the other half distinctly did not.

The lunch food was served on white plastic-foam plates, and today’s menu was burgers and french fries. I saw one kid open his cheeseburger and place several fries on the meat, then added ketchup, and then put the bun back on top. You know, that’s not a bad idea. I might have to try that recipe the next time I have a burger and fries. But he then added more ketchup to the top of the bun, and so when he tried to eat the sandwich, he got the mess all over his hands. I’ll learn from that mistake and just keep the ketchup on the inside of the sandwich.

It’s interesting to note that the kids segregated themselves into boy tables and girl tables. Last year, when I visited his kindergarten lunch, the boys and girls mingled. My son’s “girlfriend” always sat beside him, and all the tables were gender mixed. But this year, they are definitely keeping to their own gender for lunch companionship.

When their 30 minute time was almost up, the cafeteria monitors rounded the class up and had them stand to the side in a line. I said good-bye to my son and went to stand by the exit to watch them leave. I held the door open as they came through, and my son again stood by me until everyone was out. He gave me a big hug and said, “Thanks for coming Dad.”

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com

Thursday night are game night with my friends. We were intending to play Dungeons & Dragons, but we did more talking and joking than any real playing. Some non-game talking and joking is pretty normal for our game nights, but last evening, we probably got in only an hour of actual play time.

My current group consists of four guys between 31 and 51 years old. We’ve had as many as seven people in our group, two of them women. But when it’s just us guys together, we seem to revert to being 13 years old. Our jokes are juvenile, or topics of conversation aren’t polite, and we generally act like pubescent boys.

We talked and laughed till midnight. We usually get plenty of gaming in among our joking and talking, but last night we spent more time ragging on one guy’s home state than we did any gaming.

I prefer to play the game, whatever game, on our game nights—I look forward to these evenings each week—but occasionally, guys just need to be silly. A man who outgrows, or has no outlet for some silliness, becomes boring. Our game group allows for plenty of silliness. We might be boorish at times, but we sure as hell ain’t boring.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com

There was an unexpected knock at the front door yesterday late afternoon. My 6 year old looked out the window and said, “It’s a lady I don’t know.”

I opened the door, and sure enough, there was a middle-aged woman standing there. Her minivan was parked in our driveway; the side door was open, and I could see a young child in the seat.

The woman said she wasn’t sure she had the right house, but she was looking for the woman who gave music lessons. We bought this house over six years ago, and I know the woman of the family that lived here then taught piano out of this house. I explained that the woman who taught music no longer lived here, and hasn’t for six years.

“Do you know her name?” this woman asked.

I have a vague recollection of the name, but it’s four or five syllables. I said, “I think it’s something like,” and I tried to pronounce it two or three ways. I doubt any way was the actual, correct way. I apologized for mangling the name beyond usefulness.

The woman standing on my porch asked was I sure I didn’t know the name. I said I was sure. She asked if I knew where she lived. I said I didn’t know. She asked, “But she doesn’t live here?” I paused a moment, confused by the question. “Right,” I confirmed.

This woman then explained that the music teacher taught her older daughter, and she wanted the teacher to teach her next daughter. “Yes,” I said, “I’m sorry, but I don’t know how to get up with her.”

Then this woman asked if I had anything with the music teacher’s name or address on it. “No,” I said, “it’s been six years.”

“Wouldn’t her name be on the, . . .” she gestured with her hands, “contract, or whatever the papers are?”

At this point, I was about to laugh. This was absurd. This woman just seemed disbelieving that she had the right house, but was six years too late.

“Yeah,” I said, “her name is probably on the paperwork. But it’s filed away, and would take a while to get.”

“Would take a while to get,” she repeated.

She stood there a few moments as if hoping I’d go find the papers. After several seconds, she must have realized I wasn’t going to do it, so she just thanked me and walked off the porch. I watched her go back to her van, and then closed the door.

That was an interesting encounter.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com

I stopped at the ATM in front of a Piggly Wiggly (a grocery store) in my hometown. I was amazed by the trash scattered around on the ground. Nearly all of the trash was just the paper receipts printed out by the ATM—a carpet of scattered white paper.

There’s a paper trash slot in the ATM for disposing of the receipts, plus, the machine directly asks the user if he or she wants a receipt to be printed. So the mess of discarded receipts is from pure laziness of the ATM users. Pathetic.

Out of curiosity, I picked up a couple of the receipts from the ATM counter and looked them over. I then grabbed up a handful more—there were about a dozen pieces on the counter, and probably another two dozen on the ground. Just pathetic.

But, the mess gives interesting information on the people who made it.

9/21/07 23:26 PM (11:26 at night)
Withdrawal: $40.00
Balance: $250.81

9/22/07 6:36 AM
Inquiry
Balance: $7.41

9/22/07 13:39 PM (1:39 in the afternoon)
Withdrawal: $60.00
Balance: $45.14- (that’s negative $45!)

9/22/07 14:47 PM (2:47 in the afternoon)
Withdrawal: $20:00
Looks like the receipt didn’t finish printing; no balance info

9/23/07 00:18 AM (12:18, after midnight)
Withdrawal: $120.00
Balance: $5.62

9/23/07 7:39 AM
Inquiry
Balance: $130.27

9/23/07 8:16 AM
Withdrawal: $500.00
Balance: $432.61

I find this kind of random information interesting. (Granted, I can find just about anything interesting.) Such data brings up all kinds of questions and fun imaginings.

How did the one person withdraw $45 more than he had in the account? I’d have loved to make that kind of withdrawal back when I was in college.

And what kind of night was the person withdrawing $500 hoping to have? And was it worth half his bank total?

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com